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Former Cumming police chief’s wife killed by fallen tree during Irma

Eason couple was checking on sister with health issues

Emergency crews responded to a house Monday afternoon where a tree crashed onto a car, killing a woman in the vehicle.
- photo by Jim Dean

Isabel Hughes

DCN Regional Staff

Updated:
Sept. 12, 2017, 2:26 p.m.

Family and friends are mourning the unexpected loss of former Cumming Police Chief Mike Eason’s wife, who was killed Monday evening in her north Forsyth driveway after a tree downed by winds from then-Tropical Storm Irma fell on her vehicle.

Nancy Eason, 57, died on-scene after being trapped in the vehicle her husband was driving shortly after 6 p.m. Sept. 11, according to Deputy Doug Rainwater, a spokesman for the Forsyth County Sheriff’s Office.

“We diligently tried to rescue [her] with personnel using chainsaws and the 'jaws of life,' [however] she died at the scene from her injuries from the tree striking her vehicle,” he said. “Her husband was in the driver’s seat of the car and was checked [for injury] by fire personnel and EMTs, but he was not transported [to a hospital].”

Mike Eason was named police chief in 2005, where he served until 2009. Prior to that, he spent 31 years with the GBI.

Cumming City Administrator Gerald Blackburn, who knew the Easons, said the two were “very much community-oriented people” who worked for several organizations.

“This was very much an unexpected tragedy,” he said. “She and Mike were a big part of the community, and Nancy will be sorely missed. They were active at the Friendship Baptist Church and volunteered in a lot of different civic organizations as well as different events in the community, and she was very dedicated to her family.”

Blackburn said that devotion was present even during her death.

“Nancy was helping a sister who was having health issues, and she and Mike went to check on her [when the tree fell],” he said. “That’s just the way she lived her life – so very dedicated to family and friends.

“I’ve known her for a lifetime, and they’ve just been in the community for so long. Our thoughts and prayers are with Mike and their children.”

Eason is the third confirmed death in Georgia due to Irma.

The body of a 62-year-old man who climbed a ladder behind his home was found under debris on the roof of his shed in southwest Georgia, where winds topped 40 miles per hour. His wife reportedly called 911 saying he’d had a heart attack.

Another man, in his 50s, was killed just outside Atlanta when a tree fell on his house in Sandy Springs.